South African Born Willem And Mariska Have Seen It All – Southern Sky, That Is

A Similar Latitude South Of The Equator Means The Same Wonderful Sky That We See In Oz

It might seem a long way from South Africa to Australia, but that’s nothing in comparison to the distance of NGC 1365 that Willem and Mariska viewed with us. The largest Barred Spiral Galaxy known, it is – to be sure, a faint object as viewed through the eyepiece of a telescope. (as opposed to long time exposure used in photography). But at 65 million light years distance, the light from NGC 1365 that reaches us now, left the giant island of stars when dinosaurs we walking on and ruling planet Earth! That’s 65 million years ago, with light travelling at 300,000 kms/second!! Yes, you read that correctly. It’s not 300,000 kms/hour … but per second. Yikes! 🙂

The universe is filled with stat’s that twist your imagination and one realizes pretty quickly that our “self-importance” is a grossly exaggerated thing, as far as the universe is concerned. We are very important in our own universe, but in the “universe’s universe”, we’re really a fairly puny bunch of coconuts! But enough of the philosophy … When it comes to sizes and distances it is almost incomprehensible to us to relate to the figures; but is is great fun contemplating them 🙂 … If you join us at Honeysuckles Astronomy Tours, we’ll take you on a journey into the unbelievable.